Thursday, December 22, 2011

Is the Tea Party Racist? (Reprise)

There's no use rehashing old topics -- unless of course new information comes to light. I've previously addressed whether I think the Tea Party has a racist bent. A question I answered in the affirmative.

Now some new articles about Ron Paul's newsletter offer a bit more "evidence" for my assertion. The most recent story references how RP walked off the set after being asked about statements made in a newsletter that bore his name.

This story links back to a previous one with more information: The Story Behind Ron Paul's Racist Newsletters. In this story, newletters bearing RP's name contained statements such as: this one concerning the LA riots "Order was only restored in L.A. when it came time for the blacks to pick up their welfare checks" and that Martin Luther King, Jr. was a "world-class philanderer who beat up his paramours" and who "seduced underage girls and boys."

Paul's defense is that he used a ghostwriter and that those inflammatory statements came from him/her (although he isn't able to identify who it was). This is, unfortunately, no excuse in a publication that bears your name and which publishes articles written (supposedly) by you. Hence "ghostwriter." No one is supposed to know the identity of the other writer and the named author bears all responsibility for it.

Anyways, in a bit of comic relief, RP in a Youtube video here actually compares himself to MLK! I wonder if that comparison includes the accusations made in his newsletter . . .